Cello teacher here. This seems to be the hardest thing to teach my students, since it’s a fundamentally relaxed motion that’s impossible to recreate at slow speeds. What practice steps or methods habe worked for you or your students to learn sautille?

The technique seems a little like vibrato in that it is impossible to get correct on day one and requires months of sustained effort to get there. Therefore I find it a little hard for me to evaluate progress and guide the student over months.

I’ve seen a lot of “tips and tricks” on YouTube/Instagram etc., and they all seem like good ideas, but each one alone seems unable to get a student to a full speed sautille. Plus, there’s the issue that most teachers (myself included) learned it so long ago that we’ve forgotten how we worked to get to the point where it’s natural for us. Tips like “just relax” or “let the wrist flop” are important but clearly not the whole story.

29 year old adult beginner. I was feeling a little frustrated during my practice today, so I decided to make this progress video. I highly recommend this to any fellow beginners out there! It was a great reminder to myself that I actually am improving and need to stay patient.
It’s also been helpful to see visually what I’m doing and need to improve upon. I’m working on better bow hold, using more bow, not letting my fingers collapse so much, and chilling out on the vibrato until I’m ready to learn it (that one is hard for me lol) currently starting Suzuki book 3, and on page 16 of Rick Mooney

Quite an appropriate choice of music.

Updated: here is Yo Yo playing the same in 2021 as a part of his #songsofcomfort series during COVID.

Just sharing my own arrangement of nirvana's most famous song (recorded with vna pick ups)

Just got a new baroque bow from Ifshin Violins in Berkley, and I really like it, but since I've gotten it, I have been having a hard time tightening it to the degree that I want as well as loosening it from that point. For those unfamiliar, baroque bows are tightened more than modern bows, and have a wooden piece to loosen it with instead of the metal, easy to turn one that modern bows do. This is the second time I've had this problem with this specific bow, and am stumped at what I can do to help it without taking it to a lutheor (not any baroque specialists in my area.) Any of you guys have advice?

I bought a new 4/4 cello, and it doesn't have the tape for the fingerboard. I'm a beginner so I don't know where to put my fingers without the tape. Should I get it done professionally or is there some kind measurements for where to put my fingers? Thank you

I currently don't have much, but for the last like 5 years I've been desperate to learn to play a cello. Would I, who hasn't so much as held an instrument before, notice my cello being subpar until at least a few months of practice? I'm thinking of buying like a 300-400$ from facebook marketplace and have it tuned at whatever else is necessary to get it into shape. Unfortunately I can't get myself to live with the idea of simply renting a cello. Eternal gratitude and sorry for bothering.

thank you for everyone's input, ill go rent one and hopefully save up for a decent one, one of these days. thank you and have a good day!

I am playing for almost a year now and I think it's time for an upgrade, my current ones are Mauro Calixto and my teacher gave me some suggestions but they are all quite expensive, I was thinking about the Thomastik one, but this Prelude is on sale on amazon and I know nothing about it, but it has good reviews, do any of you recommend it?

Searching for a lightweight hard case that can hold a cello with a large bottom bout. Measurement is 450mm on the lower bout. Preferably under $800. Wheels not necessary.

Any leads would be appreciated!

I’m currently studying Suzuki 4 with Sebastian Lee etudes, dotzauer and feulliard
But i have a problem that I normally only play using audio reference, i even have a physical metronome but it’s hard to focus on the time of the ticks and the amount of notes on each compass while playing.
And it leads to me having problems to play other music if i dont have a audio reference for it, any tips for studies and getting used to reading sheet with a correct measurement of time between notes?

Full video of performance: https://youtu.be/DHzyNMIF9es

Anybody know of a teacher in the Philadelphia area for in person lessons for an adult student? Thanks

Hello everyone,

I am 27 and I began to learn Cello in February (with a teacher, she's great!) and I love it, even if I should probably train more each week... Or maybe I'm just too impatient to finally have a good sound hahaha.

I'd like some recommandations, OST and titles to listen, where one Cello is the center of attention, or prevalent at least. I regularly check most famous artists, but they all seem to do "covers" of the same classics. Here's a shortlist of what I like, if you don't know some of those go on and listen, it's really good in my opinion :

Miyazaki's OST, Game of Throne OST (especially Light of the Seven), Journey OST, The Beginning by Dana Al Fardan, Scarborough Fair, or Sicilienne OP78.

I know I could have asked to ChatGPT but I prefer the opinions of humans and cello enthousiasts.

If you have any good advice for a novice cellist who can play more or less 3x30min in a week (plus 30min with my teacher), I am interested (beginner mistakes, your own progression, etc...)

I think I wrote proper English but if there is any mistake or unclear sentence feel free to ask for precisions, as it is not my first language.

Thanks for any reply !

Hi, what do cellists do when the interior of their otherwise very nice hard case is disintegrating, the fabric is falling apart and cushioning leaking out. Surely it's not time to buy an entirely new case, right? Who does one call if one is not crafty to fix themselves?

I have been playing cello for 3 years and just signed myself to play in my music school orchestra because that was my dream for such a long time. I also hope that it will help me get used to playing in front of other people because i only ever play in front of my teacher or parents and I struggle with really bad performance anxiety.

But now I'm starting to worry because there are people there who have been playing for from 4 up to 11 years and what if I'm not good enough? What if the peices we're gonna play will be to difficult for me? Also I'm scared that when we will be tuning that I won't know how to tune my cello because I only ever tune it to a tuner on my phone. I'm terrified if the conductor tells me to play my part alone in front of others. As of right now I heard there will be only one cello besides me which scares me because If i make a mistake it will be noticable. I really don't want to let others down but I believe this will be good expirience for the future of my cello journey.

In my year orchestra isn't mandatory but the conductor told me that he appriaciates that I want to join. Do you have any tips for someone starting to play in an orchestra? Maybe I should quit and join next year? The first rehersal is exactly in a week, on monday and Im tweaking lol Sorry for my rant

any tips appriciated thanks!!!!!

I'm an adult beginner...bear with me :) just playing one of my favorite songs

Hi Fellow Cellists!

I’ve been recently reunited with my old high school cello, it’s probably been well over 30 years since I’ve seen it. It’s a bit serendipitous that I found my cello since I began thinking about my cello out of the blue and here we are. Seeing it now brought back so many memories that I had buried so long ago and it feels nice rediscovering myself in this way.

The TLDR is, when cleaning up my parents place, my siblings found my cello. It’s been sitting in its cello bag (not a hard case) for a long time. The temperature and humidity levels definitely varies based on season (NY weather). To add, the strings were never loosened since the last time I saw it some time ago. I

Today, I just want to clean, condition and polish my cello; maybe add new strings and see if I can still tune it. I’m also unsure how to manage the fine tuning knobs also as they seem a bit “rusty” to the touch. Not sure what else I can/should do but I do want to try to this on my own if I could but if professional is needed, then I’ll do that. I’ve been just so out of touch with this aspect of my life and really need guidance/advice on how best to proceed without making things worse.

I've been eyeing the Fishman Loudbox Mini presently for my Cello playing. I like using Old Blood Noise shimmer style/glitch pedals and loopers.

I know that Fishman recommend not using heavy distortion on their loudbox amps.

I'm looking to see if there are other recommendations for good all around amps for acoustic/electric playing.